April 7, 2014 5:33pm EDTApril 7, 2014 5:28pm EDTA pit-road speeding penalty had a silver lining for Brad Keselowski Monday afternoon at Texas Motor Speedway. For anyone who thought that Keselowski was running easy late in the race to allow Team Penske teammate Joey Logano to win, his fast run down pit road — speeding by 0.8 mph in one zone on the final pit stop — should be sufficient evidence.Brad Keselowski(AP Photo)

For anyone who thought that Keselowski was running easy late in the race to allow Team Penske teammate Joey Logano to win, his fast run down pit road — speeding by 0.8 mph in one zone on the final pit stop — should be sufficient evidence.

The penalty prior to the green-white-checkered finish sent Keselowski to 19th, and the 2012 Cup champion managed to only gain a few spots to finish 15th in the Duck Commander 500.

“I hope you know that wasn’t the case (I was laying back),” Keselowski said. “I definitely wasn’t doing that. I was 105 percent, so that’s why got I a speeding penalty. I broke the rule the other way.”

Keselowski, of course, was making reference to NASCAR’s “100 percent” rule that is designed to eliminate team tactics such as a driver trying to help a teammate win. The other incentive for Keselowski, who won earlier in the year at Las Vegas, to keep racing hard is that every regular-season win is worth three bonus points for the opening round of the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

There was no argument from Keselowski that he was speeding. Drivers have a tendency to speed up and slow down in the timing zones on pit road, hoping their average speed isn’t over the limit. At Texas, the speed limit was 45 mph, but with a 5 mph “tolerance,” they aren’t considered speeding unless they average 50 mph in the zone. Keselowski was clocked at 50.8 mph in the next-to-last zone, which ends just past the final pit box.

“Normal pit-road deal,” Keselowski said. “We’re in it for wins. We’re not in it for finishing second. Second or 15th is the same to us.

“You’ve got to go for the win. … I sped and ended up 15th. It had to be really close. If it would have worked out, I might have been able to win the race from it. It’s just part of racing.”

“I was definitely wondering what happened — I knew it was the jet dryer that caused it,” Keselowski said. “It was one of them freak deals.”

Crew chief Paul Wolfe said the car was significantly damaged. They pitted several times for repairs.

“The jet dryer caught it just right and obviously these hoods aren’t made for air to go into the side of them like that,” Wolfe said. “It pulled it up so hard that the hinges fastened in the back, it bent those hinges and it had the hood — it’s a carbon-fiber hood and they just kind of held it up.

“Once we were able to push it down and put the bearbond (on it), it was back to all good.”

At first, NASCAR wasn’t going to allow Keselowski to come down pit road to fix his car. But after other drivers complained of similar problems, NASCAR allowed all cars with hood issues to come down pit road and make adjustments.

A couple of weeks ago at California, Keselowski did not get a break from NASCAR when a pit-road official was waving the green flag signaling that the pits were open but the pit-road entry light was red. Keselowski didn’t come down pit road but was told that the flag overrides the light.

“The difference was it happened, to some affect, to a lot of teams,” Keselowski said. “It was unfortunate, but I’m thankful that NASCAR gave us a little bit of a break, and I think it was a fair break that even if it wasn’t me, I’d like to see them give.”

The car was fine after that and Keselwoski appeared to be a factor for the win as he led three times for 85 laps. But he lost the lead on a Lap-227 restart to teammate Logano and never had the clean air the rest of the way. That’s why Keselowski was digging on pit road — the only way to win would have been to beat Logano and others out of the pits.

“I just was trying to get a little too much on pit road,” Keselowski said. “It is a shame. I wanted to get us up front and be able to win the race.

“I just tried a little too hard. … I knew I was right on the limit. I wasn’t really surprised.”

It seemed that Wolfe took the finish a little harder than Keselowski, even though their teammate Joey Logano won the race.

“I’m really frustrated right now,” Wolfe said. “I’m excited for the 22 bunch and Team Penske. It’s big, but when we go out there and race, it’s all about my team and trying to find victory lane. … It came down to that restart there when we were leading and Joey was able to get the lead from us.

“From that point, Joey was good enough, we weren’t going to drive up there and pass him. We have to figure out how to be better on our restarts.”